girls rock !!

With a fantastic cover story in Rolling Stone, world-wide chart-topping success for her new single, and an appearance on X Factor in the UK, Britney Spears reclaims her crown. She looks fit, performs perfectly, and sounds back to her alert and funny self in interviews.

Few singers can growl to such effect in their songs as Britney, and it’s great to hear her husky speaking voice back to its best as well. In recent interviews Britney has been focussing on the music and the thrill she gets when hearing a great song.

Some great songs appear on her new album Circus and there is more variety - which may offend some dance-pop-only fans. Britney has said she enjoyed the changes of pace, moving through dance queen to naughty as well as girly. Pleasure is in the ear of the listener.

Meanwhile we welcome the return of a great singer and a trend-setter in so many ways.

Yelena Isinbayeva has been named the 2008 World Athlete of the Year for women, a record third time she has won the title. Isinbayeva also won the award in 2004 and 2005, in large part due to her capability of continuous improvement. As well as breaking the world record an amazing 24 times, Isinbayeva was the first woman pole vaulter to clear 5.00 metres.

Athleticism is matched with intelligence and Isinbayeva holds both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees after graduating from the Volgograd State Academy of Physical Culture. Recently promoted to the rank of Captain in the Russian army, Yelena is also carrying on with post-graduate studies.

At the age of 26 Isinbayeva is seen as the best female pole vaulter in history. She has already been a 9-time major champion. Yelena holds gold medals in all major competitions, including Olympic, World outdoor and World indoor, European outdoor and European indoor, plus World Junior and World Youth when she was younger. Few athletes can claim such an extensive record of success.

The Athlete of the Year titles are awarded by the IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federations) and the Men’s 2008 winner is Olympic champion sprinter Usain Bolt.

The final numbers are not in yet, but unless there is a musical miracle from someone else, Bleeding Love will be the best selling single of 2008 - after achieving that same honour in 2007 also! And the single is already the best selling single of the 21st century so far!

The charts also prove Leona Lewis is appreciated world-wide. Bleeding Love has achieved the number one spot in 34 countries! So far! And those countries include Oz, Canada, Japan, UK and USA, plus just about every country in Europe, and even Mexico and Russia. The single was also the first by a UK female solo artist to top the end of year sales in the 55 year history of the official charts. Leona’s debut album Spirit also achieved number one in 9 countries so far.

As we have been saying since Leona rose to fame courtesy of X Factor, her voice is a magnificent instrument, with colour and tone of great variety to match the fantastic range. Great respect to her producers and managers to have allowed time for Leona to develop and polish great songs, from husky whisper to full voice clarity. The new single Run showcases the wonderful strength and power that Leona can wrap around such pure emotion. Fantastic!

Whether you believe in some or all of astrology, or none, there are some interesting names that get grouped under various signs. As Sagittarius includes Jane Fonda, Bette Midler and Tina Turner, there may be something to the idea of people born under this star sign as being creative extroverts.

Other famous sagittarians include Gregg Allman, Beethoven, William Blake, Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa, plus Walt Disney and Steven Spielberg. And the complementary sign, Gemini, includes Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, Marilyn Munroe, Prince and Brian Wilson. So pioneers, risk-takers and adventurers with great versatility are pretty accurate character traits.

Jane Fonda combined a great career as an actress alonside video fitness guru and political activist. In fact Jane Fonda’s Workout video sold 17 million copies, the most of any home video ever.

Also fantastic as a dancer and Amazonian inspiration is Tina Turner, whose live shows were a triumph of athleticism as well as vocal power.

Speaking of the Olympics (see Modern (Russian) Amazons) the American women’s basketball team won their fourth consecutive Olympic gold medal. You may think other countries lack depth in the sport to be real contenders, but Australia in particular have often come close.

In fact, Oz and USA both won all five of their group games, so just the final made the difference between them. And USA do not always win the World Championships either, as Australia took the crown in 2006 with a win over Russia (USA came third).

Aussie Penny Taylor (photo) won the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award in 2002 and 2006. As a professional basketball player, Penny holds a strong position in the WNBA in the USA and played for Phoenix Mercury. She led the team to their 2007 WNBA championship title. Michele Timms, also one of Australia’s greatest female basketball players, played for Phoenix Mercury in the past.

In these times of the credit crunch and possibilities of tax reductions, one is reminded of Lady Godiva. Attractive and powerful enough to make a difference, she may have tried or even succeeded in reducing taxes.

One version of the popular story says Lady Godiva took pity on the people of Coventry, who were suffering under her husband’s unfair taxation. Weary of her requests, he said he would take action if she would ride naked through the streets.

The story continues that, after issuing a proclamation that all persons should keep within doors and shut their windows, she rode through the town, clothed only in her long hair.

In a modern-sounding twist, it’s claimed a tailor (now known as Peeping Tom), disobeyed the proclamation and bored a hole in his shutters so he might see Godiva pass. Lucky the internet did not exist at the time!

The great American media machine sure does grab only-just-legal talent and provide maximum exposure. Along with the many and often sexy photoshoots that have featured Hayden Panettiere, and a number of cameo roles in tv shows and films (and often maximum cleavage), our favourite screen cheerleader is now on the music radar.

A pleasant enough pop song, Wake Up Call is more coy than raunchy and better than the karaoke outings of so many other actresses. Hayden has also been seen at a number of music events, and hanging with some big names - like with Rihanna at the MTV Video Music Awards (pictured left).

Hayden was also seen alongside Britney Spears’ little sister Jamie Lynn at the Hollywood party for Teen Vogue’s 5th anniversary of their annual Young Hollywood round-up. Plus she has shot a saucy calendar for Candies - life just gets better!

So while you browse YouTube for Hayden’s growing list of risque clips, check the music ones too.

As well as strong representation in the Olympics and international finance, not to mention elite models and chart-topping singers, the modern Russia is producing exceptional talent in the supreme sport of gladiatorial power and prowess.

Yes, of course we are talking of tennis! There are other sports which pit one person against another (athletics, golf, etc) but there are few which demand such physical stamina and mental strength as tennis. The combination of psychological pressure and physical capability is probably only equalled by boxing. And both are gruelling and, often, damaging to the athlete.

On a much brighter note, however, is the dominance of Russian women in the end of year rankings in the official WTA Tour chart.

5 in the Top 10

In a year which saw one of our favourite modern Amazons, Dinara Safina (pictured right), rise to No. 2 in the world rankings, she is joined by four other Russians:

• No. 5 Elena Dementieva
  No. 6 Sharapova
  No. 7 Kuznetsova
  No. 8 Zvonareva

Safina also became just the fourth to rise to world No. 2 since the inception of computer rankings in 1975. The other impressive countrywomen are:

• former No. 1 Maria Sharapova
  former No. 2 Anastasia Myskina
  former No. 2 Svetlana Kuznetsova

All our respect and congrats to Dinara Safina for a magnificent year.

And returning to the opening paragraph, Russia swept the Olympic women’s medals table with Elena Dementieva (gold), Safina (silver) and Vera Zvonareva (bronze).

There are dozens of online polls you can vote in every day on the web. The results are often interesting, even if the participants are self-selecting - online and with time to take polls. But there are two large demographic groups who dominate the web, teenagers and silver surfers. The middle-aged are often not well represented online.

The inverse is true with street polls, as there will often be a heavy weighting to the middle aged. So street polls about politics will often give different results to online polls about politics. The recent American presidential race showed how polls can be rather inaccurate.

When we come to popular culture, however, the arts, music, movies and the like, then online polls can show better snapshots of overall public taste. People of all types will often take the 60 seconds to vote for a favourite book or film or song.

The results of the Entertainment Weekly poll on Sexiest Femme Fatale perhaps show appreciation of ‘classics’ despite the rampant marketing of films and ’stars’ of recent years.

And Sharon Stone, in Basic Instinct 2, continued smouldering to amazing effect.

The American music scene is dominated by variety, in large part due to geography. The big cities and coastal states (California, Florida, etc) support and produce pop and rap/hip-hop and, still, rock. The agricultural ‘middle’ states are huge with country and selective pop and rock. So the 2008 American Music Awards are an interesting mix.

One song can sum up the mood of the country, No Air by Jordin Sparks and Chris Brown. With Jordin’s fantastic vocal range and Brown’s smooth soul counterpoint, the rousing song covers pop, soul, r&b, female vocal and male vocal, all in one neat package.

No surprise, perhaps, that both singers won significant categories: Sparks for Favourite Adult Contemporary Music (yes, they still have that type of classification) and Brown for Favourite Male Artist.

Favourite Female Artist was won by Rihanna, and Favourite Country Female Artist was won by Taylor Swift, so no surprises there.  Perhaps the only surprise was Linkin Park picking up Favourite Alternative Rock Music.